


wiþ sauhte and make heom sele

by omphale23



Category: Merlin (BBC)
Genre: Challenge fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-03-14
Updated: 2010-03-14
Packaged: 2017-10-08 00:19:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/70762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omphale23/pseuds/omphale23
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The prince didn't know of the random inexplicable curse that followed him, and he grew up proud and strong and utterly brilliant, despite the handicap placed on him in the form of a totally shite servant named Merlin.</p>
            </blockquote>





	wiþ sauhte and make heom sele

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [tobreakthespell](http://community.livejournal.com/tobreakthespell). Based on [The Nixie of the Mill-Pond](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Nixie_of_the_Mill-Pond).
> 
> With thanks to [sansets](http://sansets.lovejournal.com) for invaluable beta assistance. I'm just going to keep dragging her into fandoms behind me forever. Or vice versa.

** _bounds of house and home_ **

Such things begin with a bargain entered freely; this was no different. Uther Pendragon, recently named king and lord of all he surveyed, went in search of magic to bend to his will and bring him his heart's desire.

And when he asked for it, he got more than he expected.

"Oh for—Merlin, that's not the way it went. He was tricked. She was a witch, witches are evil and don't follow the rules. What else could have happened?" Arthur kicked at the campfire, which stubbornly refused to kick back.

"Do you want to tell the story?" Arthur glared, but shook his head. "You weren't even awake for most of it. Now, here's how it happened."

Uther wanted a son. Of course he wanted a son; he was a king and a king without a son is no king at all. Did he think about what it would cost? Does anyone, when given the promise of their greatest desire? He was a king, but even kings are human.

"I'm pretty sure that's some form of treason." Merlin rolled his eyes, and pulled the bandages tighter. "Fine. Continue."

Even kings are human. Uther was human, and Nimueh was a nixie.

"A witch."

Nimueh was a nixie. And, at times, a witch. A priestess, and often a sorceress. Many things, at many times. It's possible she was even human, when she needed to be.

"Not bloody likely."

Merlin stood. "Look. You want a story that we can tell when we get back. Either you button it, and let me come up with something, or you can explain the whole thing to Gwen when she asks where we've been. And Morgana. And your _father_." Arthur grimaced with distaste, and took a bite of his dinner. He grimaced again. But he stopped muttering under his breath about incompetent storytelling.

Thus Nimueh gave Uther what he demanded, or offered to do so, for a price. She asked no more than the next life to give birth within the walls of Camelot. Uther gave the promise easily, resigned to the loss of a horse, or perhaps the mother of one of the many brats born to the servants. He turned away from the Lake and its Lady, satisfied that he would live to see his child ready to take his place on the throne.

It was, as it always is, more complicated than he expected.

He had underestimated Nimueh's power, and when the year turned with no new lives within the castle walls, it brought the birth of his son and took with it his Queen.

Uther never again pledged his troth, but by then the damage was done.

"Can't we just leave that part out? It's not as if anyone expects Nimueh to have reasons for what she does. We'll just call it a curse and—avoid that part." Arthur was poking at the fire with a branch, and he wouldn't meet Merlin's eyes. "I don't want to—can't we just start a bit later? And say 'curse for reasons unknown,' or something."

Merlin gave up. "Fine. Where do you want to begin?"

** _day dawned true and bright_ **

The prince didn't know of the random inexplicable curse that followed him, and he grew up proud and strong and utterly brilliant, despite the handicap placed on him in the form of a totally shite servant named Merlin.

"Oh, _now_ who's engaged in character assassination? A little less of that, if you know what's good for you. I can still turn you into a frog, don't think I can't."

"Yes, but how certain are you that you could turn me back after? Because otherwise you'll have to go before the council on your own. Good luck with that."

The prince grew up, and he was taught all the things he needed to know to lead his kingdom. He learned swordplay, and languages, and the history of the land that would one day be his. He grew to be the greatest warrior his country had ever seen. His people loved him, and in return—

"Loved is a bit strong." Merlin smirked over the last of his dinner, and Arthur kicked him in the shin. "Tolerated. Flattered. Maybe appreciated for his looks while the people were stinking drunk, if we're being charitable."

"You love me." Arthur looked smug when Merlin looked away, searching for a bag of sand.

"Only a little. But mostly because you're vastly improved over the day we met, thanks to my excellent influence. And that's hardly the point."

—in return for this devotion, he gave his strength for his people. Even the rude, clumsy, completely disrespectful boy his father saddled him with as a servant. In every way, Arthur was a Wonderful, Brilliant Prince who patiently coped with all manner of frustrating peasants in funny neckwear.

"Hey!"

As a prince, he was above responding to the petty jealousies of a manservant who didn't know what a wonderful liege he had been given. Arthur strove only to make his father proud. And so when his father ordered that Arthur avoid the Lake, and its inexplicably vengeful occupant, Arthur was happy to oblige. Unfortunately, his bumbling manservant was rather crap at following directions, and managed to get himself lost in the forest while out gathering wildflowers.

"They were herbs! Gaius needed them for a remedy, you complete—"

"Now who's interrupting?"

The servant, whose name was Merlin, although he'd have better been named Now-What-Have-You-Done-Wrong-You-Bumbling-Fool for accuracy's sake, got lost in the forest and the Prince, who really had much better things to be doing, was forced to go in search of him. And despite his father's warnings, the obedient and remarkably well-endowed Prince found himself following the servant to the shores of the Lake.

"And then Arthur-the-Prat tripped on a root and fell in wearing his damn armor. And sank like a stone."

"And then Arthur-the—I did not trip! You were leaning over and stood up too fast, and you kissed me and then went _weak_ in the _knees_, fell over, and knocked me in!"

"Yeah, but do you want to present that version to your father and his council? Because I'm a bit attached to my head, thanks. I don't think jumping the Crown Prince in the middle of the afternoon is the sort of thing that gains me any points in his favor. So if it's all the same to you, I'd rather skip that bit."

For reasons that don't need exploring, the Prince found himself trapped beneath the surface, pulled there by the witch's—

"She's a nixie." Merlin went back to scrubbing out the dishes with sand. "There really is a difference." Arthur wasn't sure the dishes could possibly be that dirty; it looked as though Merlin was well on the way to scrubbing a hole through his favorite cooking pot. "Not that it matters, since either way she was trying to kill you."

—pulled there and held in the Lake's chilled depths by Nimueh's enchantment.

His servant watched this all happen like an utter berk and then panicked.

Merlin jumped to his feet and started gesturing. "I did not! And how would you know, you were _enchanted_ and I couldn't wake you up, it all went so fast that by the time I—and you were so cold, and you wouldn't wake up and then I couldn't get you loose, you just kept sinking in that damned _mail_—and Nimueh was laughing, and I knew it wasn't working. So I just—didn't know what—you wouldn't—" Arthur took his violently clean dagger out of Merlin's hand, and pulled Merlin back onto the log.

"You're right, I was enchanted. Your turn." Merlin settled against Arthur's side, shivering.

** _by sundown to return to hearth_ **

Arthur, who was a careless arse and had neglected to warn Merlin about any of this curse business, was caught and entirely useless beneath the waves. Merlin—who was completely and utterly lacking any magic of his own and yet reluctantly determined to rescue the prince for some unfathomable reason—bravely set out in search of a solution or, failing that, some sort of substitute prince, who would undoubtedly bring much joy and prosperity to the kingdom.

"The number of falsehoods in that introduction are staggering." Arthur looked torn between disgust and awe. "I mean, the adjectives alone."

Merlin, although he really was quite happy in the quiet brought by Arthur's enchantment and content to live out his days free of the unreasonable and potentially deadly attachment Arthur had to telling the absolute truth, set out in search of an old woman he happened to know in a nearby, but powerful, kingdom who might be able to help.

"I thought you'd gone back to Gaius."

"I did. But I can't very well say that, can I. I needed _magical_ help. How do you think that would go?"

"Oh. I knew that."

Merlin, a dedicated and fearless servant, nearly died several times while climbing the lonely and dangerous paths to the woman's high cave. He truly deserved a reward for his service, perhaps in the form of time off or even a new set of clothes to replace the ones covered in rotten artichokes from an unjustified day of humiliating punishment the week before.

"Merlin should bless his lucky stars that he only spent three hours in the stocks that day, and get to the point." Arthur leaned closer, and kicked at Merlin's boots with his own. "Besides, the reward I intend to offer isn't one meant for public knowledge." Merlin most certainly didn't blush. "Right, this is taking too long."

** _neither the millpond nor the watermill_ **

Merlin visited the anonymous old woman, acquiring no more than a slightly twisted ankle in the process, and even that was probably caused by his own clumsiness. The woman, who wasn't a witch or even very magical and certainly not worth pursuing given that it all turned out right in the end, offered sage advice. Which was fantastic, because otherwise the servant might have dithered forever and all would have been lost.

The prince could have remained trapped, and the people would have mourned him, tearing their garments and falling into despond, leaving the fields fallow. There could have been famine, and disease, and the knights who loved their prince more than anyone could have ridden off to throw their lives away in battle. The King's ward could have pined and faded away with regret at the things she had once said to the prince, and Merlin himself could have thrown himself from the castle walls in grief.

"Yeah, lucky for us there was that harmless old woman to prevent the disaster."

"Exactly."

And so, under the old woman's instructions, the servant—who really was a bit of a girl, Merlin, honestly—sat by the Lake and combed his hair like a great _girl_ while thinking girly thought of his prince's remarkable courage and handsome features—

"You are getting it completely wrong. You're not even trying at this point, and we've got to figure out something before—" Merlin pushed Arthur's hand out of his lap, "—before we can go home. Where your bed is, I might add."

** _golden comb upon the sand_ **

Merlin, although he was highly skeptical of the whole thing and disapproved of magic in the most strenuous of ways, agreed to sit and use a golden comb given him by the possibly-mental old woman from the cave who resided in another kingdom entirely. He was as surprised as anyone to find that, when he threw the comb at her scheming face, the nixie caught it. Even more shocking, the prince's enormously inflated ego rose above the water's surface.

"It was my head."

As previously stated, the prince's hugely conceited head rose above the surface. Intrigued, the servant pulled out a golden flute—

"Liberated from the castle's stores, no doubt. Unless that's a euphemism for something else." Arthur leered in a way that wasn't at all endearing. "Wink, wink, nudge, nudge, know what I mean?"

"How do you manage to train or hunt or sit through audiences without getting arrested for gross indecency?"

Arthur shrugged. "I'm the prince. So far the only times I've been arrested and sent to the dungeons involved you. Why is that, do you think? Maybe you're a bad influence."

"Maybe you should go soak your—"

"The story, Merlin."

The servant drew from his trousers—from his jacket, _stop that, Arthur_—a golden flute crafted by his best friend in Camelot, a woman who really would have been a much better match than the annoying and sex-starved prince, but there's no accounting for taste. Merlin played a beautiful, haunting melody on the flute, a song which politely overlooked the massive flaws of Arthur of Camelot and sang only of his limited good qualities. It was an exceedingly brief song, because the servant could only work with the materials he'd been given, and because they'd spent slightly too much time crafting the flute the night before. As it ended he placed the flute upon the sand, and the nixie snatched it away. The prince's chain mail emerged from the water, unfortunately bringing more of the prince along with it.

"It sounded more like screeching cats to me."

"Do I look like I've had time to learn the flute? No, I haven't, because I'm eternally following you around and magicking us out of trouble, when I'm not cleaning your chambers and convincing women that they don't want to throw themselves at you."

"Wait, when did you do that? Are you the reason I've been having such terrible luck with the serving girls recently?" Arthur tilted his head, considering, and Merlin flinched.

"What? No, of course not. Quit distracting me."

"From the caterwauling of your golden flute."

"It was out of tune! Gwen was in a hurry because hello, enchanted. Do you have any idea how difficult it is to find a mystical musical instrument on short notice? I did the best I could, and it did work." Merlin bit his lip. "You could pretend to be a bit impressed."

The third gift in exchange for a terribly ungrateful member of the royal family was a golden spinning wheel. Strictly speaking, the servant was meant to be using it to spin straw into gold, but it turned out that was another tale altogether. Lucky for them both, as the servant hadn't ever been that good at spinning. Or weaving. Or sewing on complicated buttons.

"Or servanting. I don't think we should do too much embroidering from nursery tales, lest someone get suspicious. And it's not as if anyone needs the reminder that you're a failure at most of the tasks you're meant to perform in my service."

"Servanting's not even a word, you prat."

** _ensuing flood of the nixie's wrath_ **

While the witch—

"Nixie."

While Nimueh was distracted by the servant's incredible lack of skill at all things servanting, the bold and decisive prince had fully emerged from the water. Wasting no time, he pulled the servant away from the Lake and the two set out for home.

"You wasted a little time. That's how we ended up getting caught."

"It wasn't a _waste_, Merlin. It was a—proportional response. To your kiss. We just got a little carried away, and _you_ said that Nimueh was appeased. I thought you meant she'd gone off somewhere to torment someone else. Anyway, it's not as if you were objecting to—"

"You tore my shirt in half. I loved that shirt."

"It was falling apart already. Good riddance."

"And my trousers are never going to—"

"Fine. You can have a new set of clothes as soon as we get back, if you'll just stop talking about it."

"Deal."

Despite the prince's best efforts, they were unexpectedly and without warning overtaken by the wrath of—Nimueh—and would have drowned but for the intervention of the old woman, who turned the prince into a sleek trout and the servant into a toad. With warts.

"That's no good."

"What? I'm not telling my father a witch snuck up on us in the middle of a very satisfying, Thank-Wiglaf-We're-Not-Dead tryst. Or that you are terribly bad at defensive magic and I was turned into a frog; it's too mortifying. It's like that horrible story about Prince Charming in the kingdom beyond Mercia. He still accidentally ribbits when he gets drunk."

"No, I mean—well, yes, that part's wrong, but more importantly, we've said she isn't much magic. If she's not magic, she's hardly likely to be able to change us into animals."

"We can't very well tell the truth. You accidentally turned me into a _frog_. And then took a week to turn me back. I ate bugs, Merlin. Bugs."

** _time passed as time does_ **

Somehow, through a miracle, the prince and his servant were turned into graceful otters rather than the more traditional slimy amphibians—never mind what an otter is, it doesn't matter—and slipped away on the current. When they awoke from what was probably a magical sleep caused by the nixie, they were far apart.

"You mean the servant was lost in the woods, and the prince was still a frog, and the servant hadn't the faintest idea what to do."

"Something like that. Good thing for you Gaius had that extra tank to keep you in while we figured it out. Even if the croaking was massively irritating."

** _fortune's turning favored_ **

Despite the difficulties, the servant and the prince eventually found each other again.

"You mean, 'the prince bellowed like a fishwife the instant he turned back to a prince, and the whole castle heard him, so the servant had to think fast and sneak them both out into the forest again to make a proper entrance.' Um. Sire." Merlin had the grace to look worried at Arthur's glare.

"No, I mean the servant left his _magic book_ out where the prince could trip on it and potentially break his neck, and then freaked out and accidentally transported them both in a highly irregular manner to the middle of nowhere. Without any horses. But, inexplicably, with bedrolls and dishes, although he couldn't be bothered to bring along any decent food. Or wine."

"Well, maybe if the prince hadn't been in such a snit, the servant would have been able to take a moment to _think_, and they wouldn't be in this mess. Also, you've torn these trousers as well. That makes two pairs you've ruined, and if we're going to keep doing this you'll really need to learn to be more careful."

"Or I could forbid you to wear trousers."

Despite the difficulties, the servant and the prince eventually found each other again, as they were destined to do. And made their way home, following the unerring directional sense of the prince and only marginally hampered by the servant's continuing inability to listen and watch where his feet landed.

"Don't forget the prince's irrational fear of millponds."

** _and they lived happily ever after._ **


End file.
